5 ms·

What is your solution to scarcity, then?

by pitaj 7y ago

toomuchtodo 7y ago
The elimination of scarcity through prudent investments in automation and technology. Energy and mass in, Maslow’s Hierarchy out. It’s the distribution (and prevention of the gains from being collected by the few) that is most important. Even if not done voluntarily, it will happen organically through IP “theft” from the haves to the have nots. The details are more about how history looks upon parties involved.
yeahitslikethat 7y ago
Controlled consumption.
- pitaj 7y ago
  That's kind of vague, do you mind going into some more detail?
  - yeahitslikethat 7y ago
    Only allow people to own and control what is naturally reasonable. If a lion kills more than will fit in its belly it shares the rest with the pride. If there's still more than the Lions can eat, the hyenas eat. Then the vultures. Then the bacteria. Humans have no such natural limit on their ability to consume. Bank accounts can be infinite. One person can own all the houses. The logical conclusion of capitalism as we know it is this: One person owns everything. Things that can't go on forever, don't.
    - andrenth 7y ago
      Who decides what’s reasonable? The logical and factual conclusion from capitalism thus far is that more people have owned more stuff than each previous generation.
      - yeahitslikethat 7y ago
        Only a benevolent dictator could make that decision. As it stands people who already have more than they, plus several generations of their progeny, need make that decision. The owning of more stuff has contributed to an accelerated carbon cycle and the untimely advance of a major global extinction, likely rendering humanity extinct. Source (book): https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062364807/the-ends-of-the-world/ https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062364807/the-ends-of-the-... Hn says I'm posting to fast, so that's it from me. Which is ironic because knowing this will happen causes me to want to invest less in each post, rather than more like the Hn guidelines say to do in conversations like this.
        andrenth 7y ago
        I think you’re moving the goalpost here. Initially you said the problem was one person owning everything. Now you say people owning too much is the end of the world. We don’t have and will not have benevolent dictators, so we have to make do with the real world. Given that, our best bet seems to be the system which has brought us to the unmatched current levels of prosperity.
        yeahitslikethat 7y ago
        They are both problems. Just stated in response to the arguments for capitalism. I say capitalism creates a world where ownership accumulates to too few people. We see that in the wealth gap. 6 people own as much as 50% of the all people in the world. Yes you can say those 50% also have better lives, however those better lives came without any controls on consumption. Capitalism has promoted green house gas emissions and lots of other bad things too. So while on the surface it seems good that we have more, it's not. It's worse. If we all had less right now, we'd be fine. If we don't have more tomorrow, we'll be fine. If we start having less, we might be better off. We don't even know well need the things we will think in 10 years are critical to own. See where I'm going? Capitalism needs limits. If you as 1 person own as much as 1% of all people, isn't that enough? Is time to divest some assets. likely assets you didn't earn.
keerthiko 7y ago
First step: confirming actual scarcity. Tell me, what basic human necessity or resource for individuals is in actual global scarcity right now? Food? Housing? Schooling? Internet/knowledge access? Sanitation? There is hoarding, rent-seeking, market-controlling of these things, but not actual scarcity, except maybe sanitation, and possibly healthcare if you count that as a resource rather than a process. Pure capitalism as the vehicle of resource distribution has been proven as a failure to distribute existing resources to the lower echelons of society, even after multiple generations. Any solution that requires more than 2 generations to "solve" what it was designed to solve, I think we can safely call a failure. It's time to try something else.
- pitaj 7y ago
  Scarcity is not the same thing as shortage.
- manicdee 7y ago
  There’s a scarcity of oxygen, real estate, food, and fresh water. We can’t just keep expanding the population, and we have already started a mass extinction event with the few billion we have now. What’s the world going to be like when we hit 11 billion in a couple of decades? In Australia we have overconsumed fresh water to the point that our largest cities treat desalination as “water supply” rather than “environmental disaster”. When the fresh water availanlemis not enough to sustain your population, it’s not the water supply that’s the problem.

What is your solution to scarcity, then?

by pitaj 7y ago

What is your solution to scarcity, then?

The elimination of scarcity through prudent investments in automation and technology. Energy and mass in, Maslow’s Hierarchy out. It’s the distribution (and prevention of the gains from being collected by the few) that is most important. Even if not done voluntarily, it will happen organically through IP “theft” from the haves to the have nots. The details are more about how history looks upon parties involved.

yeahitslikethat 7y ago

Controlled consumption.

pitaj 7y ago
That's kind of vague, do you mind going into some more detail?
- yeahitslikethat 7y ago
  Only allow people to own and control what is naturally reasonable. If a lion kills more than will fit in its belly it shares the rest with the pride. If there's still more than the Lions can eat, the hyenas eat. Then the vultures. Then the bacteria. Humans have no such natural limit on their ability to consume. Bank accounts can be infinite. One person can own all the houses. The logical conclusion of capitalism as we know it is this: One person owns everything. Things that can't go on forever, don't.
  - andrenth 7y ago
    Who decides what’s reasonable? The logical and factual conclusion from capitalism thus far is that more people have owned more stuff than each previous generation.
    - yeahitslikethat 7y ago
      Only a benevolent dictator could make that decision. As it stands people who already have more than they, plus several generations of their progeny, need make that decision. The owning of more stuff has contributed to an accelerated carbon cycle and the untimely advance of a major global extinction, likely rendering humanity extinct. Source (book): https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062364807/the-ends-of-the-world/ https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062364807/the-ends-of-the-... Hn says I'm posting to fast, so that's it from me. Which is ironic because knowing this will happen causes me to want to invest less in each post, rather than more like the Hn guidelines say to do in conversations like this.
      - andrenth 7y ago
        I think you’re moving the goalpost here. Initially you said the problem was one person owning everything. Now you say people owning too much is the end of the world. We don’t have and will not have benevolent dictators, so we have to make do with the real world. Given that, our best bet seems to be the system which has brought us to the unmatched current levels of prosperity.
        yeahitslikethat 7y ago
        They are both problems. Just stated in response to the arguments for capitalism. I say capitalism creates a world where ownership accumulates to too few people. We see that in the wealth gap. 6 people own as much as 50% of the all people in the world. Yes you can say those 50% also have better lives, however those better lives came without any controls on consumption. Capitalism has promoted green house gas emissions and lots of other bad things too. So while on the surface it seems good that we have more, it's not. It's worse. If we all had less right now, we'd be fine. If we don't have more tomorrow, we'll be fine. If we start having less, we might be better off. We don't even know well need the things we will think in 10 years are critical to own. See where I'm going? Capitalism needs limits. If you as 1 person own as much as 1% of all people, isn't that enough? Is time to divest some assets. likely assets you didn't earn.

keerthiko 7y ago

First step: confirming actual scarcity. Tell me, what basic human necessity or resource for individuals is in actual global scarcity right now? Food? Housing? Schooling? Internet/knowledge access? Sanitation? There is hoarding, rent-seeking, market-controlling of these things, but not actual scarcity, except maybe sanitation, and possibly healthcare if you count that as a resource rather than a process. Pure capitalism as the vehicle of resource distribution has been proven as a failure to distribute existing resources to the lower echelons of society, even after multiple generations. Any solution that requires more than 2 generations to "solve" what it was designed to solve, I think we can safely call a failure. It's time to try something else.

pitaj 7y ago
Scarcity is not the same thing as shortage.
manicdee 7y ago
There’s a scarcity of oxygen, real estate, food, and fresh water. We can’t just keep expanding the population, and we have already started a mass extinction event with the few billion we have now. What’s the world going to be like when we hit 11 billion in a couple of decades? In Australia we have overconsumed fresh water to the point that our largest cities treat desalination as “water supply” rather than “environmental disaster”. When the fresh water availanlemis not enough to sustain your population, it’s not the water supply that’s the problem.